Google's Mystery HUD Glasses Could Be on Sale By the Holidays

Google Goggles could soon become a set of physical goggles if murmurings from within the company are true. Could this be the death knell for smart phones?

According to a New York Times report, several unnamed Google employees have reiterated that these "Google glasses" will be hitting the market by the end of the year and will retail between £160-400. Purportedly under development at the Google X Labs, they're said to be Android-based (obviously), work on both 3G and 4G networks, and include a suite of sensory equipment.

According to reports from 9 to 5 Google, they'll likely resemble the Oakley Thumps. The glasses are also expected to include a built-in low-resolution camera that could be employed in object and location identification. This would allow the glasses to overlay pertinent information about your surroundings — though there's are a bevy of privacy implications to be hashed out with everybody wearing, and potentially recording, everyone around them. "You will be able to check in to locations with your friends through the glasses," one Google employee added.

On the software side, the glasses will reportedly work with a large number of Google's services — including the Google cloud, Latitude, Goggles, and Maps — while displaying the information in a Heads-Up Display.

Navigation will be unique, to say the least. According to 9 to 5 Google's Seth Weintraub, "The navigation system currently used is a head tilting to scroll and click. We are told it is very quick to learn and once the user is adept at navigation, it becomes second nature and almost indistinguishable to outside users."

The glasses are apparently not designed for constant wear, though if they're anywhere near as cool as they sound, you'll be hard-pressed to find me without a pair on. [NYT Bits]